Thursday October 13, 2022; 9:35 AM EDT
I once asked a journalist who uses Substack how he felt about their editor. His response surprised me. He said he loved Substack and basically wouldn't say anything critical about it. I said I was asking as a software developer. I was wondering if there was any reason to try to put together a nice editor for Substack users, I wasn't asking a "gotcha" question the way a journalist might. I had no intention of quoting the person. My writing isn't like that. I don't quote people very often, and usually if I do, it's without saying who they are, as in this bit. #- It was kind of a hypothetical question anyway, because I can't write an editor for Substack users, they don't permit it. Writers have to use their editor. It's the only reason I don't use Substack myself. I have my own editor that suits my writing style, and don't plan on switching, ever. And I recognize that it's also a lock-in tactic. They make it hard to publish through Substack something you published elsewhere. #
- micro.blog, written by Manton Reece, who I've written about here recently makes it incredibly easy to publish stuff published elsewhere as part of your blog. I recently decided to learn how it works, again, after playing with it a bit when it first came out. It's an interesting product that I sense started out very simple, but over time got so many features that now it's hard to approach as a newbie. But after a number of sessions being somewhat confused, I think I now understand what the product is at its core. #
- First it's a simple blogging tool. Posts can have titles. You edit in a plain text editor. The system supports Markdown styling and links. It supports outbound RSS, and where it gets interesting is that it supports inbound RSS too. So I can give it the URL of my linkblog feed and everything I post there appears as if I wrote it on micro.blog. In fact I did that a long time ago the first time I tried it out, and it must appear to some people as if I've been a regular user all along. People reply to my linkblog posts. I feel bad about that. It seems selfish of me to do that, to push ideas into a system, but to not be there to respond on behalf of those ideas. But I haven't taken the link out, at least not yet. :-)#
- The interesting thing about it, and the reason I put the two products together in one piece is that micro.blog has the one feature that imho would put Substack over the top, and give it a shot at world domination. On the other hand, wouldn't it be nice if micro.blog added a newsletter feature to put a little pressure on Substack to open themselves up a bit more? 💥#
- PS: I haven't described all the features of micro.blog. For example, in addition to each user having a blog, each user also has a timeline, like Twitter. You subscribe to other users. Not sure if you can subscribe to external RSS feeds (which would make it a feed reader too). Where the boundaries are is where the confusion is, at least for me. #
- PPS: I think my presence there makes people uncomfortable, perhaps. While the product is a paragon of openness, the community seems kind of closed, basically part of what I think of as GruberVille. All things that emanate from John Gruber's blog. I am not part of that world, but I have an account. I am harmless, I have no desire to interfere with micro.blog -- I think it's wonderful that someone is doing what Manton is doing. As I've tried to say a number of times, my product is interop. I am 67 years old and am aware that every time I start a new product it could be my last. I am not trying to conquer anything, however I am trying to shake at least one part of the web out of the deep sleep it has been in ever since Google Reader took over and then was axed. #